178 proceedings: biological society 



W. L. McAtee described the behavior of ducks, geese, bitterns, 

 jacksnipe, and kingfishers in North Carohna during the recent con- 

 tinued cold weather; the kingfishers' activities being confined to the 

 vicinity of spring holes. 



The regular program of the evening was as follows: 



Emerson Stringham : Notes on the speed of fishes, especially thealewife. 

 Mr. Stringham said the question of the speed with which fish swim 

 has elements which, it would seem, might make it popular, but there 

 appear to be few recorded observations. It becomes of economic im- 

 portance in connection with the effect of water power development on 

 the fisheries. 



Three preliminary points should be mentioned. In the first place 

 some fish, besides swimming, are able to jump from the water and by 

 this means pass over a current which it would be wholly impossible for 

 them to swim through; we are not concerned here with that question. 

 Secondly, it is assumed that if a fish can maintain itself against a steady 

 current of so many miles an hour, it can swim the same number of miles 

 an hour in still water. Thirdly the velocity of a stream is much less 

 at the bottom or behind obstacles than at surface. 



A Belgian engineer (G. Denil), while studying fishways, concluded 

 that the salmon could swim at a speed of 3.15 meters a second for at 

 least 14 meters. The author also refers to similar figures given by a 

 French engineer. In a report on the obstructed condition of the 

 Frazer River published in the Report of the British Columbia Com- 

 missioner of Fisheries for 1913, the author (G. P. Napier) expresses 

 the opinion that the limiting velocity of a steady stream up which a 

 sockeye salmon is apparently capable of swimming a very short dis- 

 tance lies between six and seven miles an hour. Mr. H. von Bayer, of 

 the Bureau of Fisheries, published a paper on fishways in 1910, in which 

 he said that the current velocity in fishways should not exceed 10 feet 

 per second. It is remarkable that the three figures, which appear to 

 be independent of each other, are almost identical. The Belgian esti- 

 mate is about 6.9 miles an hour, the Canadian's is 6 to 7 miles an hour 

 and the American's is 6.8 miles an hour. 



In the spring of 1917 Mr. Stringham had an opportunity to study 

 several fishways in Massachusetts, and to make some observations 

 on the velocities of water up which the fish swam. These fish belonged 

 to the species Pomolohus pseudoharendus (Wilson), one of the common 

 alewives. The instrument used to measure the velocity of the water 

 was a Price current meter lent by the Bureau of Standards. Measure- 

 ments were made of the rate of flow at 7 points in the fishway where 

 the current appeared to be greatest, and it was found to vary from 4 

 to 5 feet per second. At Middleboro the fish were imable to ascend a 

 little sloping falls where the velocity was about 11 feet per second. 

 Just below they were swimming through one place where the current 

 was 5.3 feet per second. At East Warham the head of water, and there- 

 fore the velocity could be varied. The fish swam up a slope about 3 



